Trophy 17 - A room of one's own

This is how I like my flat most: in the living room, I can hear the leather of my thrift shop sofa squeaking as Gary shifts his weight. The smoke of his rollie starts to make its way into the kitchen where I'm making us Yasmin tea. The smoke finds its way through my open bedroom door as well, so that when I go to sleep tonight, the fragrance will remind me of my best friend's presence. What the smoke doesn't reach are my statues and paintings, because the door to the second bedroom is locked. As far as Gary knows, it's a storage room.
When I carry the tea tray into the living room, I see that Santa has made himself comfortable right next to Gary, almost forcing him to finger the soft fur of his flank.
I smile and sit down on a cushion on the floor; Gary flicks ash from his ciggie on a saucer next to the sofa; Santa makes the tremendous effort of lifting one big ear.
“Been up to much lately?” I ask.
Still stroking the rabbit, Gary gives me a serious nod. “Believe it or not, mate, I've been thinking about your little predicament.”
“My what?”
“You know, your problem with the ladies. But not to worry, I've got just the girl for you. The name is Angel.”
“Gee, thanks, but you don't have to set me up with a date.”
“Don't tell me you want to save yourself for Mrs. Right,” he says. “There is no such thing as the right woman. Only women who are good enough. Plural.”
“That's lovely, but I think I'll pass on this one.”
“Seriously, Angel's perfect: blonde, big tits, tiny waist, firm grip, more flexible than a snake charmer's snake...”
“I assume you've been there? Why do you need to set her up with someone else? Is she getting too clingy?”
“Not Angie, man. This girl is a professional.”
“Professional what?”
Gary leans forward to kill his cigarette butt, making Santa sit upright. “A professional whatever you want her to be. You ask her on a date, she gives you a quote.” Smoke escapes from his lips as e speaks. You pay upfront, tell her your problem over dinner, she gives you another quote and does the job for you there and then if you want.”
I'm awestruck. Is my best friend really telling me to lose my virginity to a prostitute? But all I can ask is: “Is this legal?”
“I doubt she pays income tax, but to be honest, I would find it a huge turn-off if I knew the tax man would get 40% of what I gave her, don't you think?”
“A rather harsh pimp-charge indeed.”
It's too much for Santa when Gary tries to retrieve something from his pocket. Dissatisfied, he stamps his foot and jumps off the sofa.
When Gary has found the scrap of paper he was digging for, he puts it face down on my table. “Best get it over with as soon as possible,” he says, “no man should have to wait twenty-three years. Especially not a good-looking lad like yourself.”

Trophy 17 - fruit flies like a banana

I started wearing my dad’s wedding ring on my the first day at the Job Centre Plus. After feeling uncomfortable with the attention girls in uni had been giving me for the past three years, I thought giving off the message that I was taken would keep my female colleagues at a safe distance.

That first morning, when I was getting dressed for my first day at the office, it didn’t occur to me that my mum would sooner or later tell them that I am far from married, nor did I think of the fact that most people only get near their five-a-day if you count forbidden fruits. In a nutshell, my life would be a whole lot easier if I would’ve left the ring at home that day. Once I’d started wearing it, though, I felt there was no way back.

My colleagues and I go for lunch together several times a week. They tell me all about their internet dates, boyfriends and heartache, and I know they’re hoping to hear my secret to a successful relationship. Little do they know the secret is not to have one.

I’ve decided a long time ago that if they ask about my wife, I’ll act surprised, and when they point at my ring, tell them it’s my dad’s. I’ll show them that mum's name is engraved on the inside, and I'll pretend to be well sentimental about the fact that my male role model disappeared when I was at such a tender age – even though in reality, I’m glad I didn’t turn out like him.

Ever since I came up with that escape, I’ve been looking forward to the day someone asks about my ring, yet so far, none of my colleagues has.

Elaine is the first to ask.

And even though it’s none of her business, I shake my head.

After everything that has happened between us, I wouldn’t dream of inviting her into my emotional sphere again. But all she had to do was be here. Look at me. And ask. If I would’ve had some time to think about the script of my own life, I would’ve given myself a line along the lines of “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re referring to. Has Christian Bale gotten back to you yet?”

But my head shook before I could think about it, and my mouth spoke before I could read the autocue.

“I’m not married,” I said, “and I haven’t changed. Neither have you, by the way. You look good.”

What am I doing? Am I chatting her up?
If I am, it seems to be working, as she smiles, takes my hand and scribbles something on the inside of my ringed finger. “Let’s go for a drink later this week” she said.

And instead of denying that I knew her, instead of saying that I never wanted to see her again, instead of transferring her case to one of my colleagues, I looked at my finger and asked: “Is that a nine or a four?”

“A four.”

Trophy 16 - fruit flies like a banana

I'd expected her to be late – like your average parasite – but her timing was impeccable. The second surprise was that she'd actually followed my advice and tried to take more direct action. According to her form, she'd posted her CV on monsterboard, sent her portfolio to a casting agency and went into the Old Bond Street Prada store to apply for a role as store manager.

“Do you have any management experience?” I asked.

“That's what they wanted to know.” She shook her head. “But in my defence: the staff doesn't have to know that. I can pretend, you know, that's what I do.”

I gave her the old eyebrow, she copied the gesture innocently, and before I knew it, I was laughing. For customer care, laughing at a jobseeker is about as bad laughing at Madonna's manager is for a stage manager at the O2. I tried to stop, pinched my nose, coughed and excused myself, but when I looked up to her face again, she only needed to lift one eyebrow to make me crack again. I just couldn't help it. Two weeks worth of nerves forced their way out in the most inconvenient way possible. I was well aware that this was applying for a seat at the other side of my desk, but couldn't stop tee-hee-heeing. After a while, I didn't even remember what had set me off. People at the nearest free phones and vacancy machines were looking over their shoulders to see what was going on, and even the security guard noticed.

When I finally caught my breath, I managed to give the worst advice in Job Centre history: “Ever thought of stand-up comedy?”

But Elaine didn't seem to mind. She just smiled. “It's a shame the rest of the world doesn't share your sense of humour,” she said, “otherwise I certainly would.”

“I'm sorry,” I said, “that was very unprofessional. I don't know what's gotten into me.”

She looked at my hands, emphasising how I was fumbling the golden band around my ring finger again, and asked: “So you're married now?”

“I... er... this?”

“I didn't even know that was possible for people like you. Or have you chosen a side now?”

Trophy 15 - fruit flies like a banana

It's been two weeks since Elaine signed up for the dole.

I've been intending to keep this diary, as mum suggested, but was too embarrassed to actually write anything. Every time I sat down to do so, all I could think about was Elaine Johnson.

How long will it take her to get a job (meaning: will I see her again)? Did she recognize me? Does she even remember me? What does she think about what happened in primary school? Does she ever speak about it with her mother? Will she let me know if she recognises me? According to the staff handbook, I'm not meant to be looking after people I know personally - does Elaine know this, and would she ask for another customer service advisor if she did? Do I know Elaine Johnson personally?

I don't even know why I care about these things. None of it matters. Not to me. My life is what it is, hers is unrelated. That's why I didn't write, even though I sat down with pen and notebook almost every day. These pages are not meant to be filled with notes about Elaine. They are meant to be about Terry. This is my diary.

Trophy 14 - Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you'll never see him again.

“I'd like to slap him with a large trout,” says Gary when the waiter is gone. “So this fish cake you were talking about, what's her name again?”

“Elaine.”

“Beautiful name. As you were saying – you haven't had her yet, so she's on your to do list. Am I right?”

“Whatever.” I can't hold it against him that Gary's not a good listener. That's why we're such good friends. Maybe I'll get through to him some day, but not today. I don't even know what I was gonna say about Elaine. “Yeah. Top of the list.”

“That's why it hasn't happened yet, man. Never prioritise women. They're like dogs, they can smell it when you're desperate. They run a mile from you when they know how badly you want it.”

“Right.”

Trophy 13 - Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you'll never see him again.

“As if you were that much older!”

“At least I was old enough to know what a condom is.”

We're drifting off and I don't like where the current of this conversation is taking us. He's meant to find out who I am, but instead I'm wrapping myself in lies like rice in seaweed. Gary pops his sushi – wasabi and all – in his mouth while I close my eyes, preparing myself to break the tide.

“No man,” I say, “you're right. I'm more of a virgin than Holy Mary was when she gave birth to baby Jesus. My word.”

When I open my eyes again, Gary's eyes and mouth are wide open in disbelief.

“Oh come on,” I say, “don't be like that.”

But he's having none of it; he drops his chopsticks in the saucer of soy sauce and starts banging on his own chest in a rather apesque manner. He even rips open the collar and top buttons of his chequered shirt, baring a bit of chest hair. He's demonstrating his virility as if my virginity is contagious, to make sure no one mistakes us for two virgins.

“You like wasabi, sir?” The waiter is smiling like a frog while putting a glass of water in front of Gary. “You like wasabi very much?”

Trophy 12 - Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you'll never see him again.

"Did I ever tell you about Elaine?" I ask.

With a chop stick, Gary tries to push a piece of cucumber out of his rice roll. "Is she a friend of your mum?"

The cucumber slides out, leaving a square hole. I steal it off his plate. They take all-you-can-eat very literally over here, and charge extra for every item you order and don't eat. Knowing Gary, pushing a piece of cucumber out of his sushi is a way of pushing the rules. He just wants to know whether they'll charge him 5p if he leaves it on his plate. I hate it when he does that.

Gary smiles at me and asks "How do you like my rice donut?"

"Gorgeous," I say and watch how he starts filling the hole with wasabi so that it looks exactly the way it did before.

"Elaine and I used to go to the same primary school."

"Damn, were you that young when she popped your cherry?"

Trophy 11 - Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you'll never see him again.

“The words of a man who hasn't had a girlfriend for... how long?”

I overdo it on the wasabi to hide that my cheeks are turning a bright shade of lobster. “Oh, I don't know.”

Gary stares at me with big blank eyes that remind me off... well, you get the gist. This is the moment that he'll learn more about me than he has done over the past fourteen years. We've been inseparable like fish and chips since we were twelve, up to the point that teachers wouldn't know for sure which one of us was Terry and which was Gary. He used to do most of the talking, though. I'm an expert when it comes to his flings. I know everything about them, from the way they shave their seaweed to the crazy things they moan during intercourse. Sometimes I think I know more about his love life than he does. In fact, he seems to have the memory of a gold fish when it comes to women. One time, when we were in Fabric and there was this girl – off her face on fuck knows what – that kept following him around, until he told me “I think she fancies me, whaddaya think?” and I had to remind him he'd been there already – she was the one that put her fingers up his bum when she was about to come. "Are you sure?" he asked. "Sounds rank. Did I like it?"

This is the moment that my best friend will finally dive into the deep, intimate details my life, instead of wading through superficialities of employment and housing.

“You're not a virgin, are you?”

Trophy 10 - Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you'll never see him again.

Though I've never seen Gary with a rod, I would in every respect describe him as a fisherman. It's not just the bragging about size that does it. For Gary, there's always other fish in the sea. And somehow, they all fall hook line and sinker for him. We're at this all you can eat sushi bar in Soho, filling ourselves to the gills, when I look for a way to broach the subject that has been bugging me for the last few days.

“This is how I learned to go down on girls,” Gary says, “got to eat sushi before you eat pussy.”

I raise one eyebrow while dipping my ocean fresh sashimi in soy sauce.

“It's the smell,” he says, “raw fish kinda prepares you for it.”

“What are you carping about, man?” I say, “giving head is a privilege, you should be grateful you're welcome down there.”

Trophy 9 - Christmas is when you get homesick. Even when you're home.

Well, and maybe Santa's. He's stretched out on the carpet, eyeing up a life size statue that resembles Milo's Venus. The great difference is that this figure is not wearing a cloth round its hips, thus revealing the genitals one would expect on a naked Cupid: small, perfect and male.

Santa doesn't seem to be disturbed by my androgynous statue, but I'm not to keen on a second opinion. While I wait for my desktop to start up, I stroke Santa's ears.

“Hey buddy,” I say. “Did I ever tell you about Elaine?”

Trophy 8 - Christmas is when you get homesick. Even when you're home.

Santa watches me clean up the mess with a big sponge and some carpet shampoo. When I'm done, he nudges me.

“You feeling sorry, little one?” I ask.

I don't want to hop to any conclusions, but he seems pretty sorry because he follows me into the bathroom, where I empty the bucket in the sink. He's been moulting a lot recently, so that when when I pick him up by the scruff of his neck, he turns my tailored jacket into an angora jumper. The loose hairs tickle my eyes and nose when I kiss his ears.

“Don't worry about it,” I say, “accidents happen.”

Still hugging the rabbit, I open the fridge with one hand and inspect the contents for a snack. Apart from blue cheese and carrots, there's nothing that doesn't need preparation. I don't fancy either of them so I close the door again and leave the kitchen.

What do other people do on a night like this, I wonder. They might go to the shop for a bottle of wine. Watch some telly. Go to the pub. Catch up on their administration. Make love to their other halves. Check their children's homework. Fuck knows. Those things are not me. I take Santa into my atelier with me – a double bedroom with an easel instead of a bed – and I paint, sculpt or edit videos. Nothing pretentious - I'm only a hobbyist. Unlike my dad, who is a proper artist and only ever attended the school of life, I did fine arts in uni and think it's a waste not to use any of my skills any more now that I've got a day job. But my work is not meant to be seen by any other pair of eyes than my own.

Trophy 7 - Christmas is when you get homesick. Even when you're home.

When I get home, Santa has peed all over the carpet. I find out when taking off my shoes and feeling my socks turn wet. Santa is sort of litter trained and normally prefers the newspapers in the kitchen, but today he must have been feeling rebellious. If I'd known I'd end up keeping a pet rabbit, I would never have chosen a deep pile carpet.

I didn't really choose Santa – which is not the same as saying that I didn't buy him. I bought him from a farm on December the 23^rd last year. Christmas Eve would be the reunion with my dad, whom I hadn't seen since he left my mother soon after my first suicide attempt. He would come up from Newport on Christmas Eve and spend the day with me. I was so nervous – both scared we would have nothing to talk about, and terrified that there would be too many hurtful things to say. I bought the rabbit because one of the few happy memories I have of my dad is when he took me outside one Christmas day and showed me how to kill a rabbit, take off the head and feet and strip it of its skin.

I've never been inclined to use this particular skill, but I bought the white Flemish Giant because it would give us something to do. At noon, we sat opposite each other in the living room, anticipating the doorbell. Me: dressed up in my pinstriped suit, clean faced, hair combed back with gel. The bunny: in a cardboard box on the table, wide eyed and shaking with fear.

At one, the rabbit yawned and tried to lie down. The box was too small for him. I was still sitting on the edge of my chair, watching him and said: “Don't worry, they'll be here any minute now.”

By two, I'd let him out of the box so that at least he could stretch out on the carpet.

At three, I was starting to get hungry and went up to the fridge. “Can I offer you anything?” I asked my only guest. I heated up two mince pies and offered the bunny a Brussels sprout. And another one.

By nine o'clock, I sat down to a vegetarian Christmas dinner on the floor of my living room, because the main ingredient was eating it with me. The 10lb rabbit turned out to have a great appetite and finished the plate of carrot tops and raw Brussels sprouts I made him.

My father didn't have a mobile phone and I was way too proud to call my mother and tell her my dad hadn't showed up. She'd had trouble hiding her disappointment when I told her I would be spending Christmas with my father, and had made a big song and dance of making different arrangements.

Santa's been living in my two bedroom flat ever since. I never got round to buying a hutch, and don't think he would accept it if I bought him one now, after all these months. Apart from pissing on the carpet, he's a lot less messy than the blokes I used to share my student house with anyway.

Trophy 6 - The Job Centre is never greener on the other side.

When mum and I reach her house, she asks me to unpack the shopping bags while she gets something from upstairs. I inspect the content of her fridge and notice that she's put cling film over the plate of cauliflower cheese that I didn't finish yesterday. I wonder why – it wasn't that great. The bottle of wine that was still half full when I left is nowhere to be seen. For some reason, I check the bin and find the box of Magnum Minis that I'd brought as a treat. She catches me with the box in my hands.

There's an awkward silence as we stare at each other. I turn my gaze to the content of the box to find that it's not empty – there are four melted ice creams in there – and put it back in the bin.

“I've got a present for you,” she says. “I should have done this long ago, but it wasn't finished yet. As a matter of fact, I think I've got to add one more line.”

She opens a ring binder to the last page, licks her ballpoint and writes a short message. Then she hands the binder to me and explains that over the last couple of years, she's collected random facts, quotes and other fragments of wisdom for me.

“One at the top of each page. But there's a pack of blank sheets to go with it, so you can insert as many as you like between the headed pages.”

“What's it for?”

“It's like a diary,” she says, “or you can use it to write letters to me, your father or even Elaine. Letters that you don't have to send. To clear your head.”

I breath in sharply and squint like a stoner.

“Sometimes it helps to write down how you feel,” she says. “Sometimes it works better than talking to other people. Because you don't have to worry that you might hurt them.”

“You mean you don't ever want to have a meaningful conversation with me again?”

“I just think it's good for you if you can straighten yourself out on your own. It's helped me a lot, you know. A lot more than therapy.”

Technically, this is cheating. All throughout my secondary school and college, we've separately been seeing the same therapist. When I changed primary schools, social services got involved and they decided that I needed counselling. There's no denying that I was a difficult child, and I told my mother that I would only go if she did too because she needed it as much as I did.

I accept the album and start flicking through it. By the looks of things, she's cut bits out of magazines and letters. On the first page, she has written “The Job Centre is never greener on the other side.” with a fountain pen. Trust mum to give me a diary and use it to force her opinions upon me. I want to make a remark about it, but she puts her hand on mine and says: “Don't read them all at once. Deal with them when it's their turn, let them inspire you when you try to express your feelings.”

-----

Go to the opening scene of Trophy.

Trophy 5 - The Job Centre is never greener on the other side.

She wasn't always like this. My mother, who didn't want to know the baby's sex when she was expecting me, “because it doesn't matter. I'll love the child either way.” My mother, who had to tell her friends and parents the same thing after I was born. She didn't see my ambiguous genitals as a disorder and she didn't blame herself for enjoying almost every drug under the sun before she found out she was two months pregnant. No, to her, I was a miraculous gift from Mother Nature. A perfect, mythical being. A true hermaphrodite.

Of course, the doctor who did the delivery didn't quite see it that way. The diagnosis was a severe case of clitomegaly with a misplaced urethral opening. Which is why, according to my passport, I'm a woman. An hour after giving birth, with the blood still on her thighs, wearing nothing but my father's trench coat and a pair of slippers, my mother abducted her baby from the hospital. Because the doctor, sitting on the edge of the bed, had kindly suggested plastic surgery to remove superfluous tissue.

She never used to avoid the subject, though. She was proud of her decision and even told my teachers about it when I went to primary school, even though it was none of their business. I was a tomboy, but I wouldn't be the first girl with a bowl cut that liked to climb trees and play football. After mum told them, we received a letter from the headmaster that said it would be better for me and the other children if I were to be treated the same as the other girls.

I was seated next to Elaine because she was the most girlish girl of all, and our teacher hoped we would even each other out. For two and a half years, we did. We took our Barbies with us when breaking into scrap yards and put lipstick on before playing football. Until halfway third grade, when I was over at her place, and her mother walked in on me whilst I was in the bathroom and saw me wee like a boy. Natasha Johnson was infuriated that nobody had told her that her little princess was playing with a boy. She grabbed me by the collar, pushed me into her car and drove me home without saying a word. After that, she called our teacher to complain. The teacher tried to soothe her by saying that I was both a girl and a boy, which infuriated Elaine's mother even more.

“How dare you seat my daughter next to a freak!” she shouted. When my mother rang to ask why I'd come home crying, she replied that she was a bad mother because she hadn't opted for surgery.

The next day, I had to swap chairs with Diane, who used to sit alone in the back row, and Elaine ignored me during the break. When I tried to join other girls, they bluntly said they didn't play with boys, and when I asked the boys whether I could play football with them, they asked whether I was a boy or a girl.

“What does it matter?” I said.

“If you don't answer you can't play with us.”

“Why, are you too stupid to see for yourself what I am?”

“You're so stupid that you don't even know whether you're a boy or a girl!”

I stared at them and for the first time in my life I experienced that words wouldn't come. I didn't understand why this had suddenly become an issue and didn't know how to deal with the bullying. One afternoon after school, I greeted Elaine's mother who was waiting in the school yard. She gave me a look of contempt and said: “You need help.”

When I jumped off the roof of the school, half a year after the bullying had began, I shattered my left ankle, lost consciousness and woke up in hospital with a concussion. Because my mother feared doctors would want to perform female circumcision on me, I'd never been to a hospital before. They kept me for ten days, three of which I spent in the psychiatric ward. The other seven they supposedly took care of my injuries, but they also discovered that I wasn't just suffering from an interesting form of epispadias that made it possible for me to piss through the top of my massive clit. A MRI-scan showed that I had a fully formed womb with an ovary to the right and an undescended testicle to the left.

When I got home from the hospital, my mother asked me whether I wanted to be a boy or a girl. I said I was a boy. The next day, she asked me whether I would rather get married in a suit or a wedding gown. I said suit. The day after that, she asked me to choose between pig tails and a shaved head. I said 'shave it all off, I'm a boy.”

As far as I understood, I had lost my best friend because someone thought I was a boy. If I were to make new friends, I didn't want the same thing to happen, so I decided I would be better off being a boy all together.

To my mother, this was a relief because Natasha Johnson had warned her that I would grow up to be a bearded lady. This was when my mother learned to hide her thoughts and feelings, because she didn't want me to know how Natasha's remark had made her worry. She forgot to consider that I might develop voluptuous bosoms like herself. Life as boy would be rather odd with double DD.

Luckily, I take after my father's family, where the women are almost as flat chested as the men. All it takes to hide my cup A or B is an hour a day in the gym, two sports bras and a loose fitting suit or hoodie.

-----

Go to the opening scene of Trophy.

Trophy 4 - The Job Centre is never greener on the other side.

We walk to her house together and she doesn't ask. Instead, she says: “We'll need to stop at Tesco's to get some more cider. And maybe another packet of bacon. I'm thinking of penne with leek and bacon, but I had two rashers for breakfast already this morning.”

This is why we haven't had a serious conversation since I did my GCSE's. Mum's made an art of avoiding the subject. As if she can sense what's on my mind, her defence mechanisms automatically switch on. Suddenly, I feel I've been waiting for this talk for five years and I'm running out of patience.

She chatters on about five-a-days and how she's gone off Delia Smith lately, when I finally lose my patience at the booze isle.

“You'll never guess who was at my desk today.”

“Who?”

“Elaine Johnson.”

She sighs. “Can we talk about this when we get home?”

“You don't even know what I want to say yet.”

She puts a bottle of Strongbow into her basket and says: “Let's get the groceries first and discuss this over supper, okay?”

I know she'll give me “not whilst I'm cooking” and “can we do this after dinner? It's giving me indigestion” later, but I shrug and shut up anyway. There's no point in making a scene in the supermarket. I don't even know what I want to say, let alone what I want to hear from her.

-----

Go to the opening scene of Trophy.